MovieChat Forums > Terror by Night (1946) Discussion > Renee Godfrey's background

Renee Godfrey's background


The attractive but little known Renee Godfrey, wife of ex-British director Peter Godfrey, had a most interesting biography, posted by Brumbaugh on IMDB (See link below). -- Steven P Hill, University of Illinois. http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0324021/bio

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http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0324021/bio

"Her director-husband, who had flourished on 50s TV, was in ill health by the end of the decade. Taking secretarial and real estate classes to help support the family income...."

Hummmm....I find this odd that even with his ill health she would have to go out and get a job....esp. as a secretary or a real estate agent (well I can see how real estate might be an idea). Hard to believe also perhaps, that they didn't have enough connections that she might get bigger roles during this period...*

With that said, "Terror By Night" is the only film I have seen her in....and she is very very captivating, and I love her character (as well as the boy at the coffin-makers shop :), but....a comment not introduced to 'bash' her, she seems to have a bit of a problem with some of her lines, as in inflection/etc.

Maybe its just me....and/or as above, I really don't care if she isn't the best acresss in the world

Her bio is great, and I hope in spite of everything she had a happy life.

Thank You for introducing this.

* I am rather an idiot though when it comes to Hollywood of the past (and spelling/etc )


"Wait. Where are you going? I was going to make Espresso."

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She is captivating. I couldn't quite figure out her look. At times she almost looked more ethnic.

"Hot sun, cool breeze, white horse on the sea, and a big shot of vitamin B in me!"

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She is captivating. I couldn't quite figure out her look. At times she almost looked more ethnic.

"Hot sun, cool breeze, white horse on the sea, and a big shot of vitamin B in me!"

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Pardon my astonishment at the wealth of favorable comments she's received here, but, setting her background aside, I find her performance in this film appallingly bad. Her British accent is atrocious, her looks are wan (if not unattractive), and she swallows half her lines. She looks and sounds like nothing so much as an girl from the midwest trying to play Eliza Dolittle in a school play; "contract bit player" is written all over her. She comes close to completely wrecking the movie for me.

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I agree about her attempted English accent in this film-it was horrible. I wonder what Basil Rathbone must have thought of it!

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She comes across as an unattractive drip. Captivating? You're joking!

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She might have been a drip, but she definitely wasn't unattractive.

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Certainly she was a very attractive girl but yes indeed for a Londoner (such as I) that strangled accent veering from Cockney to mittel-European was very distracting...







Come on lads, bags of swank!

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I have to agree with you.

I could never make out what kind of accent she was trying to portray in this movie. Very irritating IMO.

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I have been unable to delete this film from my Sky planner as I keep looking at it to see Renee.I find her captivating, accent and all.She was absolutely gorgeous...just my cup of tea.

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At first, I thought it might be Patricia Morison who made such a big impression in the following year's Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Code but this one isn't half the actress.

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I always get her and Morrison confused too for some reason, but Godfrey is very attractive for sure. She looks like she is sleepwalking through some of the scenes. The accent is awful too "aint it", but who cares!

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That accent was so bad as to be unidentifiable. Why not just make her character American for all the difference it would make to the plot?

"Worthington, we're being attacked by giant bats!"

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I dunno about that, but her attempt at an English accent had me in stitches, and my ribs are still aching. It was terrible.



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Accent nothwithstanding, I thought her acting was absolutely appalling. More wooden than wooden thing.

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